Concentration by Roger Shikan Hawkins

The definition of concentration presupposes not only an object of concentration but an entity concentrating on that object. Alan Watts said when we try to find the essence of mind, all we find are things. When we try to find the essence of things, all we find is mind. Searching for the essence of mind, we can only come up with ideas that we make into objects of our mind, but they are not our mind itself. When we try to find the essence of the things and the notions we use to describe our ideas – including our idea of self — we cannot locate the essence of any of them. Our concepts are produced by this mysterious awareness, the presence that we are, here and now. There is no real way to distinguish who produces concepts other than awareness itself.

So in contemplative practice when we try to concentrate, who is concentrating? What do we concentrate on? In long years of Zen training I was taught only to follow my breathing. Suzuki Roshi used to tell us to follow our breathing until the awareness of our breathing disappears. What he meant is to follow our breath until all self conscious effort disappears. Or to put it another way, while observing the breath, observe the effort that arises. Ask the question, “What is this effort, really?” If we try to find the essence of our effort, we only find concepts or ideas of what we think it is. Is my effort good enough? Should I be concentrating harder? Am I able to sustain an acceptable level of concentration? And further, what is an acceptable level of concentration?

I never lived up to my own expectations about how well I should be able to concentrate during zazen. Whether it was my breath or some other object like a koan or some concept like the impermanence of all things, sooner or later my thinking mind would always find a way to do its own thing. My teachers were skillful in pointing out that to the degree that I set up standards of concentration, I was creating an idea of myself as someone who potentially possesses amazing powers of concentration. At the same time I was creating the idea of something external to myself that I needed to concentrate on. Buddha warned that if we conceive of the universal mind as outside of ourselves, we should kill that concept.

So I was caught in an idealistic practice. Long hours of sitting on my cushion brought this idealism more and more clearly into focus for me, so that I was able to see it exactly for what it was. Thus my self consciousness became an object of observation. In the process, I slowly learned to let it go. That which is observing our effort is not bound by ideas of a separate observing self. Often this observing self is called the witness, the one who observes whatever arises in consciousness as it is – the one who observes consciousness changing into other forms. The witness is fully concentrated on witnessing. There is no effort here. There is no intention to be concentrated. There is no idea of concentration, yet the concentration is complete and all-pervasive.

In this sense, concentration means complete freedom of movement, allowing awareness to move freely. Here we are free from the need to manipulate any object of awareness. The witness is benevolent. It does not judge. It always allows our wandering mind to do whatever it damn well pleases. Implicit in this process is the invitation to join in the constant peaceful witnessing. We do not have to join, just be aware that the witness is there. To be present is to allow ourselves to join in the witnessing.

We should not make this ceaseless witnessing into an object. The thought that we are already completely one with it is just another idea. But when the effort to resist it stops, suddenly our undivided nature becomes obvious. Students sometimes say to me, “I’m trying to be in the here and now, but it’s difficult.” How wonderful that they begin to realize how difficult it is to try to be here and now! Trying to be here and now is like trying to see what is looking out from our own eyes. We cannot see what is looking out because we are the looking. It is impossible not to be here and now. So when we make an effort to concentrate in meditation, we disguise our resistance to the total focus of awareness itself. Awareness is an ever-present blue sky. We mask the sky with clouds, with rain, with our thoughts and ideas and efforts.

How does one describe the sky? I cannot describe the pure focus of witnessing. Witnessing is not something we can acquire or possess. To witness means to accept the invitation of awareness to join in its free, wondrous and spontaneous expression.

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